


lo siento

by amandaskankovich



Series: danteverse [1]
Category: Shameless (US)
Genre: F/F, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-24
Updated: 2016-05-24
Packaged: 2018-06-10 08:53:46
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,580
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6949456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amandaskankovich/pseuds/amandaskankovich
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karen and Mickey driving a very long way to get Mandy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	lo siento

Her bare toes are in the wet cold sand. The sun is just starting to rise. She takes a sip from her mostly gone warm bottle of coke. It’s flat now but it was flat when she bought it.

She’s feeling weirder the longer she stares at this purple sky and the sun rising over the lake. It’s too goddamn idyllic. That’s the problem. She’s also coming at it from the wrong angle having actually woken up early for this shit, not staying up late.

She feels like she should have a fishing line tied to her toe, waiting for her breakfast to bite.

She hates fish.

Anyway it feels wrong, like it’s not for her.

She feels like it’s so not for her that her brain is actually rejecting it. She’s processing it all wrong.

It’s just a sun setting.

It’s just the sky.

But it’s too much.

It’s for people like her mom.

“Fuck can we go now!?” She calls out to him.

From inside the car where he’d been sleeping she gets no answer. So she gets up and wipes wet sand off her ass, puts her shoes back on (can’t remember why she’d taken them off in the first place) and heads for the car.

The door on the passenger side is unlocked. She opens it and gazes into the backseat where her traveling companion is a silent, sleeping, lump.

“Hey,” she says and then louder, “Hey!”

“What?” He groans not even opening his eyes as his brow furrows.

“You said forty minutes.”

“What?” He says again still not opening his eyes.

“You said forty minutes and it’s been forty minutes.” She retrieves her cell phone off the dashboard where she’d left it. “It’s been 46 minutes actually. I gave you five whole extra minutes.”

“What?” He says again finally opening his eyes slightly.

“I’m not counting the one minute this conversation is taking.” She looks at her cellphone, “3 minutes. 3 minutes this conversation is taking. But that’s like, almost 10 extra minutes now. Which pushes this to nearly fifty. So nearly an hour–”

“Oh my fucking god what are you talking about!?” He says fully awake now but laying on his back and looking up at the roof of the car. His hand to his head like, “What the fuck did I wake up to? What the fuck now?”

Not an unusual look for him.

“Mick,” she says.

He looks at her, sighs, sits up. “Yeah,” He says, “Fucking yeah, okay, let’s go eat.”

“Did you sleep any at all?” He asks her starting the car.

“Oh yeah,” she lies.

*

They get breakfast at McDonald’s. He orders a coffee. She gets a large coke. It’s nearly seven in the morning.

He eats his mcmuffin with one hand and drives with another. The whole car smells like egg and grease. She rolls down her window. She checks her texts. Nothing new so she starts reading old ones from weeks ago.

–Hey.

–How r u?

– Winky face emoji with heart coming out of the lips

– 6 Poop emojis in a row with = U

“This was a dumb idea.” She says putting down her phone.

“What?” he asks.

“Is that all you’re going to say today?” She asks him, “Is that your catchphrase now?”

“What’s a dumb idea?” He asks her.

“She doesn’t need us showing up on her doorstep okay?”

He looks at her for a long minute and says “It is 200 miles too late to be pussying out of this decision.”

Karen gets quiet. Then gets angry. “Well how the fuck do we know for sure she wants us to come get her?”

“Because she said,”Come get me!” He replies.

“Not to me.” But she doesn’t say that part out loud.

*

This was a stupid idea. Impromptu road trip. Let’s go get your ex back. This was such a bad idea. It’s like the goddamn sunset. She hates sunsets.

Mandy was never her fucking girlfriend. That was the whole appeal.

They fucked and ate junk food and made out in bars and on buses and fucked on couches and in public bathrooms and in her bed. They hugged when she left. Karen cried but not until later. Got very drunk. Fucked Lip. She made bad choices often. He never seemed to miss a chance to reap the benefits. Then try to act all soft towards her later.

Mandy got in that car. That was a thing that had happened. With a guy wearing a fucking…stupid shirt. His shirt had been fucking stupid. Dumb shit asshole stupid shirt wearing microdick motherfucker.

“You okay?” Mickey asked her.

Karen glared hard at him, “I have to pee.”

*

She did not have to pee. She sat on the toilet and cried for the…eleventh time since they’d decided to do this. She hadn’t cried since before Eddie died and now she was a fucking mess every time it got too goddamn quiet.

She couldn’t take anything anymore. The fuck?

She splashed water on her face. Breathed. Splashed more water on her face. Breathed.

*

When she walked out Mickey was staring at his own phone.

“Svetlana called.”

“Oh?” She said not really interested.

“Put Yev on the phone.” He said.

“Oh.” She said, “What he say?”

He looked at her, “‘Who the fuck are you again?’”

She gave him a look. He snorted and shook his head. “He’s two. He said, “Daddy, bird. Bye bye.” and then he dropped the phone.”

“Oh.” She said.

She didn’t give her small sad smile at that until he did first.

“I guess he saw a bird? I don’t fucking know.”

*

Mickey gets texts sometimes from this mechanic named Dante.

He met him through his brother. He’s fucking hot is what he is. Tall with these goddamn green eyes.

He rambles on at Mickey in Spanish because he likes to annoy him. “I don’t know what the fuck you’re saying. You’ve never lived out of Chicago you asshole, speak English.”

He seems to think about this for a second. The shrugs and says, “I lived in Jersey for a year once.” Then continues on in Spanish.

He lives with his grandmother. She’s a good cook. He’s getting there. He tries to get Mickey to eat dinner at his house every night. He holds him so close when they’re in bed.

He’s trying to teach Yev Spanish. Yev no longer looks surprised when he walks in the house.

Mickey thinks about this and it gets harder to breathe.

*

Mickey ignores a third text.

–Hey.

–Weren’t you coming over?

– I went by your house. Your fucking wife was nice enough to let me know you’re not in fucking Chicago? Thanks for letting me know. Asshole. Jesus fucking christ. You just do shit like this???? Don’t make plans with people if you’re going out of town.LET ME FUCKING KNOW WHEN YOU’RE LEAVING THE FUCKING STATE INDEFINITELY.

–Let me know when you’re back I guess.

*

You don’t owe explanations to someone you are not dating. He will tell Dante this when he is back in Chicago.

Dante will laugh this angry laugh. “I keep waiting,” He says.

“Let’s just..stop this shit, stop pretending.” Mickey says.

“Pretending?” and he looks at Mickey like he has no fucking idea what he’s saying.

“I don’t…,” and Mickey can’t stop the words from happening, “I’m not your fucking boyfriend.” He says.

And Dante says, “Are you kidding me?” And it takes Mickey weeks to get the last thing he says out of his head.

“Well asshole. I was yours.”

*

But none of that bullshit is until later. Days later. Might as well never be happening at all. All that matters now is he and Karen in a car heading towards his sister. She’s waiting at the bus station.

She keeps starting texts and then erasing them over and over and over.

“Hey K–” Most of them begin.

*

Mickey wants to explain it to him. He keeps starting texts.

–You’re walking and there’s a train coming towards you. Out of nowhere.

–You see the train coming.

–It’s going to hit you.

– You could move.

–You let it hit you anyway.

–Then you peel yourself off the tracks.

–Limp away.

– Find a new set of tracks.

–Another train comes toward you.

–Why would you let it hit you again? Yeah it’s a different fucking train. But–

But he can’t make his fingers type the words. He can’t begin.

*

They pull to a bus station.

Karen starts to type “H” then “e”

Just as she gets a text.

“HERE” It says and there is Mandy running out the bus station, full speed towards them and Karen doesn’t move. She doesn’t know how to move.

But Mandy is smiling and Karen is smiling.

*

And weeks later Mickey will be thinking about how to type about trains to this number he can’t seem to make himself delete.

Instead he takes a deep breath and just writes, “Hey.”

He expects silence.

He gets :

–Estúpido :)

–Text English.

–Te texto Español

Mickey thinks about what happens next. He thinks in the distance he can hear a very loud horn blaring.

He calls to Svetlana and she tells him what to say.

–Pardono.

–That is not Spanish and you know that’s not fucking Spanish.

–But yeah okay. See you soon?

–Yeah.

Mickey types.

And as he runs out of his room from inside his sister’s bedroom he hears the now very familiar sound of Karen’s laugh


End file.
